Indians have Tigers by the tail

The Cleveland Indians have dominated the Detroit Tigers in recent years, and they will attempt to continue that domination Tuesday night in the second game of a four-game series between the American League Central rivals.

Cleveland has won eight games in a row over Detroit, a streak that started last season and continued Monday night with the Indians’ 2-0 win in the first game of the series. Since the start of the 2016 season, the Indians are 28-10 (.737) vs. the Tigers.

Indians right-hander Josh Tomlin will make his second start of the season Tuesday night. It would be almost impossible for Tomlin not to improve on his first start.

Tomlin’s first start of the season, on April 3 vs. the Angels, was a disaster. He gave up more home runs than innings pitched.

In pitching eight scoreless innings in the Indians’ 2-0 win on Monday night, Corey Kluber held Cabrera hitless in four at-bats. On Tuesday night, the challenge falls to Tomlin.

Francona is more than mindful of the fact that Cabrera has a history of punishing Indians pitching.

He battled injuries last year, and I know he doesn’t get a lot of infield hits, so when he hits .300, he hits .300, Francona said. He’s certainly one of the better hitters of our generation.

The Tigers will go with Matthew Boyd, who will also be making his second start of the season on the mound. His first start was as good as Tomlin’s was bad. Although Boyd wast tagged with a 1-0 loss to Kansas City on April 3, he pitched six strong innings, allowing one run and four hits with a strikeout and no walks.

Last year, Boyd made four starts vs. Cleveland and was 1-2 with a 2.28 ERA. In nine career appearances vs. the Indians, Boyd is 1-4 with a 4.99 ERA.

Troy Vincent, the league’s executive vice president of football operations, told the Post the new rule would only require a player to control the football, and any slight movement of the ball detected via official review would not necessarily overturn the catch.

Slight movement of the ball, it looks like we’ll reverse that, Vincent told the Post. Going to the ground, it looks like that’s going to be eliminated. And we’ll go back to the old replay standard of reverse the call on the field only when it’s indisputable.